For today, we decided to present you with an updated asset structure analysis of Croatian UCITS funds.

Since asset managers play a significant role in the Croatian capital market, it is particularly interesting to see how they have been performing since the outbreak of the pandemic. As visible from the graph below, NAV of all funds has witnessed a steady increase for each consecutive month since April, and as of end January stood at HRK 18.54bn (+1.8% MoM). This still represents a decrease of 19.6% YoY (or HRK 4.52bn).

As a reminder, in March, UCITS funds observed a sharp decrease in their NAV of 32.2% or HRK 7.42bn. We note that most of the mentioned decrease could be attributed to the withdrawals from the funds, while a smaller portion reflects the change in value of assets in which the funds invest in. As turmoil on financial market subsided withdrawals from funds were halted.

The biggest decrease of a YoY basis was observed in bond holdings, which decreased by 23% or HRK 3.49bn. Meanwhile shares observed a decrease of 7% or HRK 131.44m.

On a MoM basis, bonds have observed the solid increase in nominal terms of HRK 264m or 2.2%. Looking at domestic equity holdings, they are up by 4.1%, while CROBEX was up by 2.7% in January.

Asset Structure of UCITS funds (January 2021)

Looking at the asset composition of Croatian UCITS funds, it seems that asset managers have not significantly changed their composition, which can be seen in the graph above. Since the beginning of 2020, we witnessed a considerable decrease of bonds in the assets structure which went from 65% in January 2020 to as low as 59% (April), while as of January 2021 bonds take up for 62.5% of the total assets. Such a decrease could mainly be attributed to the above-mentioned withdrawals from funds which (predominantly) invest in the mentioned asset class.

Shares have observed a gradual increase in total assets since February, and currently account for 9.3% of the total assets (or HRK 1.78bn). Note that domestic shares account for 30% (or HRK 527.5m) of the total equity held by Croatian UCITS funds. Domestic equity holdings are down by 14.8% YTD, representing a decrease of HRK 91.6m.

Total Assets of All Croatian UCITS Funds (2015 – January 2021) (HRK bn)